I'm a privacy pragmatist, writing about the intersection of law, technology, social media and our personal information. If you have story ideas or tips, e-mail me at khill@forbes.com. PGP key here.
These days, I'm a senior online editor at Forbes. I was previously an editor at Above the Law, a legal blog, relying on the legal knowledge gained from two years working for corporate law firm Covington & Burling -- a Cliff's Notes version of law school.
In the past, I've been found slaving away as an intern in midtown Manhattan at The Week Magazine, in Hong Kong at the International Herald Tribune, and in D.C. at the Washington Examiner. I also spent a few years traveling the world managing educational programs for international journalists for the National Press Foundation.
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Credit Check Company Fined $1.8 Million For Selling Info on High-Risk Consumers To Marketers

Sketchy practices by a credit check company that specializes in the records of the country’s sketchier consumers have resulted in the company paying a seven-figure settlement to the feds.

Owned by data vendor CoreLogic, Teletrack has a database of background information on the over 39 million financially-distressed consumers who frequent payday loan shops and rent-to-own stores. According to a complaint [pdf] from the Federal Trade Commission, in addition to providing credit score information to the payday and rent-to-own folks, Teletrack was keeping a database of the people who had applied for quick credit or cash — and selling that to marketers.

“For example, Teletrack sold lists of consumers who previously sought payday loans to third parties that wanted to use this information to target potential customers,” stated the FTC. That’s a no-no according to the Fair Credit Reporting Act, which prohibits consumer reporting agencies like Teletrack from selling their info to third parties that don’t have a legitimate reason for assessing someone’s credit worthiness. “Advertising and marketing” aren’t on the list of legitimate reasons.

Interestingly, when it comes to prescription records, the Supreme Court recently came to the opposite conclusion. In the Sorrell case, the High Court decided that pharmacies couldn’t be prohibited from selling information to marketers about the drugs that doctors had prescribed to their patients. The Supreme Court did not consider that information overly-sensitive as it didn’t identify those getting the prescriptions and it concluded that doctors don’t have a right to privacy in their prescription notes. The court chastised the state of Vermont for “impos[ing] a restriction on access to information in private hands.”

A spokesman from Corelogic says that Teletrack denies any violations of the FCRA, and that the company settled to “avoid the cost and business disruption that would arise from litigation.” I tried asking the FTC how they found out about Teletrack selling its records to marketers but they were tight-lipped. They get information from “competitors, suppliers, customers, and a variety of other sources” and don’t want to blow the identity of their tipsters.

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